


Secret Admirer

by MizuLeKitten



Series: Forest Guardian AU [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Fox Lance, M/M, Squirrels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-07 07:36:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11618961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MizuLeKitten/pseuds/MizuLeKitten
Summary: “I just…” Matt gestured to the pile of nuts, holding his arms in the air, “Why? I don’t get it. Shouldn’t he be piling up for winter? Why is he giving them to me?” Matt looked over at Lance, honest to god distress in his eyes, “Oh god, is he dying? Is this him leaving me all that he has left? Lance, I don’t want him to die!”Lance nodded slowly. Seeing Matt so distressed over something so small was concerning to say the least. “Do you, uh, want me to go ask him for you?”Matt sniffled, looking back down at the pile. “Please…”OR: Matt jumps to silly conclusions





	Secret Admirer

Matt stared down at the new pile of nuts on his desk. This had been going on over the course of the past week, and Matt had amassed quite a collection. He could easily tell apart the different types that lay there, his time with the Alteans and squirrels, or well… squirrel, singular, having made him well acquainted with them. The nut that stood out the most, was the vast amount of almonds, outnumbering the other nuts greatly.

It was Matt’s favorite, but not a fact that he told many people. It didn’t usually come up in casual conversation. In fact, only his boyfriends knew that, and a few animals, or one  _ specific _ animal in question.

“Hey, Matt, Allura wanted me to ask you if-” Lance cut off as he looked to where Matt was currently staring. “Marx  _ suuure  _ has been busy,” he gave a low whistle.

“I just…” Matt gestured to the pile, holding his arms in the air, “Why? I don’t get it. Shouldn’t  _ he  _ be piling up for winter? Why is he giving them to me?” Matt looked over at Lance, honest to god distress in his eyes, “Oh god, is he dying? Is this him leaving me all that he has left? Lance, I don’t want him to die!”

Lance nodded slowly. Seeing Matt so distressed over something so small was concerning to say the least. “Do you, uh, want me to go ask him for you?”

Matt sniffled, looking back down at the pile. “Please…”

Lance backed away slowly. The last thing he wanted to do was upset Matt more. Allura’s question could wait.

~*~

Matt had cleared his desk of the nuts shortly after Lance had left. He had to get to work. The nuts were in a small box though, just barely big enough to hold them all. After his initial outburst he had calmed down some. Logic came back and he couldn’t help but sigh at his antics.

Marx was not dying. He was doing what any smart squirrel would do with the upcoming winter: hiding his food source in a safe place he knew he could get back to when he needed. He was overreacting for nothing. Damn, he probably worried Lance something awful too, he never had outbursts like that.

There was a small knock on the door, and Matt looked up to see Shiro and Keith, they looked worried. Shiro was obvious, the small frown, eyebrows pinched slightly, the way he looked uncertain on if he could enter or not. Keith’s worry came in the form of a scowl, arms crossed, and body sprung tight, ready to defend Matt from whatever upset him.

“Hi, guys, what’s up?” Matt leaned back in his chair, his words acting as an invitation to the others to enter.

Shiro made his way to the other chair in the room, across from Matt. Keith, on the other hand, beelined straight towards Matt, who instinctively moved back to make room for the other as Keith plopped down in his lap.

Matt wrapped his arms around Keith, resting his hands in the other’s laps. “Sooo, you gonna answer my question, or?”

“Lance informed us that you were… distressed,” Shiro began slowly.

Keith snorted, “He said you freaked him out.”

Matt couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled out. Their approaches were so different. Neither beat around the bush, but Shiro slowly eased up to the central conflict, while Keith just jumped right in.

“I’m fine, guys, I was just overreacting about something.” Matt rested his chin on Keith’s shoulder, smiling at Shiro. “M’fine.”

“Are you sure because Lance really booked it out of here,” Shiro asked, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees, hands clasped in front of him.

“Said something about Marx.” Keith grumbled, turning and nuzzling into Matt’s neck.

Matt fought back the urge to laugh at Keith’s antics, the grumbling, not the nuzzling. Matt rather liked the nuzzling. The grumbling, on the other hand, hinted at Keith’s displeasure of Marx hanging around Matt so much.

“I may have jumped to some… rather far off conclusions,” Matt said after a moment. This earned him a confused look from Shiro, and Keith stopped nuzzling to pull back as well. Matt sighed, “He’s been leaving piles of nuts on my work desk, and I may have… assumed that that meant he was dying. It’s obvious now that he’s probably just saving them for winter.” Matt waved his hand dismissively, “like I said, overreacted.”

Keith chuckled, the movement vibrating through Keith and into Matt as he rested back against him. “Of course you  _ would  _ jump to conclusions like that.”

Matt snorted, “Careful, I’m in a prime tickle spot.”

Keith froze, “You wouldn’t dare…”

“Tickle, tickle~”

“I  _ will  _ abandon you to sit on Takashi’s lap, Matt, don’t think I wouldn’t.” Before Matt respond a loud chittering filled the room. Keith looked up, glaring at the doorway. “Marx.” The word was filled with more venom than Matt ever thought Keith was capable of producing, even when he and Lance argued.

What Matt wouldn’t do to find out what the ~ _ Squirrel Incident~ _ was that made them hate each other so much. What he wouldn’t do…

Fox Lance followed after, soft pants escaping his mouth as he trotted towards Shiro, hopping up on his lap when he got close enough, and curling into a ball. He gave a low whine and Shiro chuckled.

Guardian of the Forest really didn’t sound appealing, but sometimes Matt wished that he could at least understand animals like his boyfriends could. Lance and Keith were rather expressive animals, but more complex sentences and emotions were hard to read, and it sometimes made Matt feel left out…

Marx scurried across the floor, easily scaling Matt’s body and getting to his shoulder, the one farthest from Keith. He began to chittering angrily, and Keith scowled.

“He’s  _ my  _ boyfriend, go find your own perch,” Keith spat out.

More angry chatter before Matt felt Marx pressing against his cheek. Matt didn’t know  _ where  _ Marx learned the action of a cheek kiss from, maybe when he was watching them, but he had taken to doing it to Matt whenever he could. The oddest part is he  _ only  _ did it to Matt.

Most of the other forest dwellers feared Matt. He smelt human through and through, no magic energy to accompany him like Shiro, and no fox/raccoon smell like Lance and Keith. Then there was Marx, who from day one of meeting the Alteans had sat on Matt’s shoulder and chittered and chattered in his ear, despite Matt never knowing what he was saying.

So he accepted Marx’s comfort, accepted his little squeaks and chirps, accepted his company. It made Matt feel worse when he found out that animals could understand humans, which meant that it was literally  _ only  _ Matt being left out of the exchange.

Matt reached up and rubbed at Marx’s head, who chittered happily at him.

“He wants to know why you needed him,” Keith grumbled. Even though he hated the squirrel, he would still translate for him at least.

“Oh, uh, right.” Matt held his hand flat out next to his shoulder, inviting Marx to settle on it. Once he did, Matt moved his hand so that it was eye level, allowing them to talk face to face. “I was just wondering why you’ve been leaving nuts on my desk.”

Marx puffed up proudly and let out a slew of chitters that Matt  _ wished  _ he could follow.

“Wait, what does that mean?” Keith growled, baring his teeth.

“Keith!” Shiro scolded from his chair as he ran a hand through Lance’s fur. “They’re having a conversation, either translate it or be quiet.” Shiro sent him a sharp look, and Keith cowered slightly.

Shiro never got sharp with any of them, never yelled. Scolded? Yes. Yelled? Never. What was… Oh. Matt wasn’t dumb, and neither were his boyfriends. Was it that obvious that being unable to understand the animals they met, forcing them to translate, hurt him so much? He normally got lost, Lance and Keith loved to banter with the animals they met, so the chances of him hearing the full conversation was always slim.

Shiro had understood that once, but now he too was a part of the forest’s power…

“He said that, ‘someone has to take care of you.’” Keith grumbled as he settled back down into the crook of Matt’s neck.

“What? What do you mean? How would the nuts help me?”

Marx began to chitter again, sending a sharp squeak towards Keith at one point, and Matt couldn’t help but smile. It was like Lance and Keith in the early days all over again. Wasn’t that a thought.

There were several seconds of silence, and Matt looked over at Shiro and Lance in confusion, but they were both staring at him, or, better yet, at Marx in his hand.

“Um, guys?”

Shiro smiled, “He was complaining about how someone has to help you prepare for winter. Said that Keith wasn’t going to provide for you,” a small hiss from said boyfriend, “and that Lance, as much as he liked him, was too much of a scatterbrain to do it,” Lance huffed in Shiro’s lap. “Then he added that I would be too busy helping the other two to make sure you were well taken care for.”

Matt flushed. That was… oddly nice? Oh god, was a squirrel making him blush?

“That’s, uh, thank you, Marx. That’s very kind of you, but I don’t  _ need  _ nuts like you do. I can eat other things, so you should save them for yourself.” Matt lifted his other hand to give Marx a little scratch, “I’d prefer to see you at the end of winter a fat little squirrel.”

Marx leaned into the scratch, and when Matt began to pull his hand away, grabbed onto the finger. He kissed it, or at least the squirrel equivalent of a kiss. Then he jumped out of Matt’s hand, and scurried off.

It was silent.

“I wish I could’ve understood him…” Matt whispered as he looked down at the ground.

Keith’s arms came up, tightening around Matt, and he heard the chair scrape against the ground as Shiro and Lance walked over. Strong arms wrapped around them both followed shortly after by Lance’s noodle arms.

They said nothing because there was nothing they could say. Lance and Keith had never understood not being able to talk to animals, and Shiro had once, but had left that behind to aid Lance and Keith. Even Katie and Hunk could understand them… Only Matt couldn’t.

“Maybe,” Lance’s voice murmured in his ear, “Maybe Coran can help… I remember him talking about something like it…”

Keith’s head shuffled so that his lips were closer to Matt’s other ear, instead of muffled into his shoulder. “I remember that… Something to do with Allura’s mice…” Their voices were soft in the silence.

Matt took a deep breath, and smiled. “Hey, Lance?”

Lance leaned back, blue eyes meeting brown, “What?”

“As much as I love seeing you naked, you should probably go put clothes on.”

Lance flushed, causing the other three to laugh loudly. Shiro slapped Lance’s ass as he walked by, following shortly after, wiping a tear from his eye.

Keith paused as he got up, turning to Matt. “You should go talk to Allura and Coran later. They’ll understand better then we can.”

Matt smiled up at him. “Thanks, Keith.”

Keith gave a stiff nod, never being good at words, before turning and walking away.

Matt grabbed the box of nuts from his desk, turning it in his hand. Well, Allura  _ had  _ had a question for him. He might as well go visit now...

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be light and fluffy and then Matt angst happened  
> Idk man, idk


End file.
